


islands apart (with a vast sea between us)

by BasilGrey



Category: Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Cap is still having trouble processing that flashback at the labyrinth ruins, Character Study, Episode: s03e12 Islands Apart, Father-Daughter Relationship, Gen, I hope Wikipedia knew how to spell the name of that idol because I sure didn't pfft, Mentioned Cassandra (Disney: Tangled), all the old Lorb paintings and carvings actually look super interesting?, there's nothing like facing your angry moonstone child to make you question your parenting choices
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-19
Updated: 2021-01-19
Packaged: 2021-03-17 23:54:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28857675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BasilGrey/pseuds/BasilGrey
Summary: The Lorbs wereleaves. Small leaves with small faces, easily blown about by the wind. It was no wonder they were swayed by magic so much bigger than them.Humans were much, much stronger. It would take more than leaf-magic to have an effect on them.It would take a stone of ancient power, one that promised the means to break free from anyone and everyone and to make oneself heard—He looked back to the mural about a spring, and a coin, and a wish for something coming true.
Relationships: Captain of Corona's Guard & Cassandra (Disney)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 6





	islands apart (with a vast sea between us)

**Author's Note:**

> To celebrate the first anniversary of Islands Apart, here's something I started writing way back... wow, probably right after it aired last year. I did not finish this quickly. XD I don't think I ever in a million years would've thought of the Captain befriending the Lorbs, but I love that that's canon. It's a really fun idea to think about!
> 
> I feel like poor Cap was probably overthinking every choice he ever made as a parent after the flashback in this episode. It's gotta be tough, seeing your only child looking and acting like _that._
> 
> Next week will be the first anniversary of Cassandra's Revenge! It's one of my all-time favorites, and I'm hoping to have another oneshot to post to celebrate. Will I be able to keep up my posting streak? Maybe, maybe not—so if anyone else wants to join the countdown, please do! It's hard to believe it was a whole YEAR ago that we were all on the edges of our seats waiting to see the last half of Season 3. 
> 
> (Also - I didn't get sick at all during the entirety of 2020, which was awesome, but now I have managed to acquire a cold. If there's anything in here that doesn't quite flow or make sense, sorry! I'll try editing this more once my brain feels like it's working again. XD)
> 
> I don't write about the Cap and Cass's relationship nearly enough, but I love it a lot. <3
> 
> Enjoy!

_ROCKS CRUMBLING, SPIKES GROWING OUT OF SOD AND STONE AND SKIN—_

Little twig-like feet pattered across the large stone that lay along the wall as the leaf creature led him to the far end of the old mural.

Alfons kept his tiny hands clasped behind his back as he strolled to the end of this painting. Another painting. How were there so many massive paintings in these caverns? The Lorbs were only a few inches tall.

"As you hopefully can see with your strange bulbous eyes, tall Freinfloofer, our magic is a _most_ powerful thing!" Alfons exclaimed matter-of-factly, as if there was no question about it. Their magic was unique, perhaps, but the Captain personally doubted it was _most powerful_. These leaf creatures seemed to see themselves as a force to be reckoned with—when in reality, he could probably squash one by stepping on it if he wasn't careful.

He'd have to be careful.

_SLASH! — stone on stone and blade on block, her sword (she'd always loved swords) had cut though the old stone entryway like it had been nothing, nothing like the lack of remorse she seemed to feel when she brought a room of that fallen labyrinth down on him—_

Alfons, in his air of surprising graciousness, continued this tour of the island's caverns as if there was no chance that he didn't have his audience's full attention. The Lorb waved a little twig-arm at the next batch of paintings—wall-to-wall cave drawings in faded green and yellow and orange, overgrown here and there by vines, all faded by the passage of time. It was hard to focus on so many names and events that meant nothing to him, however.

"Here, you will see the tale of the great warlock Horb and ze dangerous enchantments he practiced... the mighty power of ze great King Lizardus... and here is the idol of Vershaftsbezeigungengien and its effects. But we all know how _zhat_ went, of course."

He needed to focus. These Lorbs had been kind to him, had looked _up_ to him, despite all his failures and the nightmares that followed him back from that wretched maze. Their leader was giving him what was evidently seen as the grand tour of the island—a visit into the heart of the small, sandy jungle, where history and legends were etched deep in the crevices of the rocks and caves; tales of creatures grasping for happiness from time immemorial.

_A cold wind had blown in the wreckage of a fallen world, and the light beat of feathered wings in the shadows always seemed be at the edge of his hearing—_

There had been a horrible sense of dread, in those ruins. He hadn't even been able to tell _what_ was playing cat and mouse with him at first.

"Our many other records are here also, here on stone where no water or upset fire-fly will harm them. If you look here, you will see records of some of the greatest events of the last twelve hundred moons—"

The Captain was barely aware of when he stopped listening, his gaze on a particularly dark section of stone. Jagged green lines were drawn on it, probably to represent the ferns and palmetto plants of the island. The green lines looked almost bluish in the dim light.

 _I ORDER YOU TO SURRENDER!_ his own voice echoed relentlessly in his head, and he could feel his throat try to close up again for the hundredth time. He had _never_ shouted at her like that. He had rarely had to raise his voice at her, even when she was young and always testing her limits. He had been stern, he supposed— _too stern? She seemed to think no one_ cared—but he couldn't recall ever shouting.

He couldn't unsee that look in her eyes. It haunted him, when he saw the blue of the sky or the pallid glow of the moon.

Her eyes were no longer the muddled green-grey they'd been since she was so small, barely old enough to string proper sentences together. She had looked at him as if she were a _stranger_ , and he was an enemy.

He had only been trying to find the Princess. There was bad news enough as it was. And now this?

"—The coin, when inserted into the fountain, will grant whosoever is the inserter _one_ wish!" Alfons announced, and the Captain suddenly felt like he should've been listening more closely this entire time. "Lorb magic is closely tied to goals and vat most perceive as happiness. It cannot create the physical, but anything else? De Lorb wizards of moons past have perfected the art of making those caught in it see whatever they wish for most!"

_Blue eyes, narrowing in hate—_

Clearly, he had done wrong. He had done many things wrong, when he was so suddenly entrusted with the responsibilities of fatherhood—small things, insignificant things, but those mistakes added up. Children looked up to their parents. They _remembered_ the little things.

If they were taught what was good and right—if they saw that people cared from the heart—if they didn't feel as though they had to block away their emotions until _this_ happened—

He had thought he'd done all right. He'd clearly thought wrong.

"What is the magic used for?" he asked Alfons, though he wasn't quite sure what made himself suddenly direct his attention back to the tiny Lorb. He was the guest here, wasn't he? It paid to make polite conversation—just as it paid to gather intelligence, wherever he could.

Alfons made a noncommittal noise of dismissal. "Oh, it is used for making oneself happy, usually," he said, waving a tiny stick hand. "Zhat is what it was designed for. Any regrets? No more! The magic promises a chance to fix things. To make a life better than what is real."

What more would he have to accept as real, as _final_ , as something that could never be changed? That he had been dismissed from duty by a king who didn't remember appointing him as captain? That his daughter had traded her heart for a heart of stone, and haunted the empty mountains like a ghost? That even her owl, who he'd seen fly to her at the softest whistle for years, had left her to follow _him?_

That a fountain and a coin on a lonely island could fix regrets, if given the chance?

All legends were born of truth. Wasn't that what the old blacksmith had always said?

"Is the fountain... real? And the coin?" the Captain asked, shifting his gaze to the little Lorb.

"Oh, ze _fountain_ is real, of course. It lies in the top of the island. But none can use it!" Alfons narrowed his eyes at the question, though strangely, his features flickered with something like fear at the thought. "It is too powerful! Even with the most noble of intentions, nothing but darkness ever comes of it!"

Nothing but darkness came of anything, these days. Corona had fallen. His daughter had fallen. He'd sworn to protect both with his life, and had failed on all counts. Did he have anything left to lose?

The Lorbs, small though they were, made up for it in haughty talk. Alfons was frowning, now, little eyebrows arched as he waved an arm with a sort of exasperated frustration.

"Freinfloofers have long been silly enough to think they can control magic. It never works! Always, magic controls them! They love their idea of power too much!"

The largest painting on the cave wall showed a crowd of Lorbs, eyes crazed and angry, reaching for a strange idol.

"And your people don't?" the Captain asked, staring at the painting for a long minute.

He didn't look to see his expression, but Alfons sounded reluctant.

"Eh... we are working on that."

The Lorbs were _leaves_. Small leaves with small faces, easily blown about by the wind. It was no wonder they were swayed by magic so much bigger than them.

Humans were much, much stronger. It would take more than leaf-magic to have an effect on them.

_It would take a stone of ancient power, one that promised the means to break free from anyone and everyone and to make oneself heard—_

He looked back to the mural about a spring, and a coin, and a wish for something coming true.

(He used to throw coins in wishing wells, once upon a time. He would hold Cassandra's tiny hand as they each threw one in. He would ask what she'd wished for, and she would scold him because _it's a secret! It won't come true if you tell someone_. She'd stare down into the bronze-dappled floor of the fountain, then, as it gleamed in the sunlight of the square, and ask if anyone ever took all that money.)

(He wasn't creative. The best wish he could come up with was for he and his little girl to live a long and happy life. The wishing wells in Corona didn't work, it seemed.)

It was probably futile. There were tales of old magic everywhere; few of them were true. But a part of him—an aching part, a part that as the Captain of the Guard he should've ignored, but as a father, he _couldn't_ —a part of him would've given anything for another chance.

"Where would one find this coin?" he asked the Lorb, his eyes fixed on the faded mural. It was an old painting, from long ago. Vines had grown up and down the wall around it, thick and tall.

Alfons sounded hesitant, but the Lorbs didn't seem to see him as a threat. And they shouldn't—he didn't mean them any harm. He'd protect them if he could. They were more amiable and unburdened by the world's problems than anyone he'd met in a long time. "No one knows! It was buried in the sand to protect all from its power!"

His little girl—his _precious_ little girl—had felt like no one had ever really cared for her, putting up armor of impenetrable stone instead. She'd become a vehement creature with icy blue eyes, someone he hardly recognized. Could that even be his daughter? The little child he'd held close to his chest that night, who had hesitantly clung to him like a lifeline, and shrieked and cried when he tried to let her go?

"...You cannot be thinking of _looking_ for it, tall Freinfloofer."

Was he? Perhaps he was. It would be no crime to look for something, after all. Still, that wasn't a fact that was likely to placate his host.

"...Oh, no," he said softly, still staring at the painting on the wall. At the coin—a gold coin, a thick one, with a likeness of a Lorb's face molded on the front.

He barely noticed the dissatisfied _hmm_ from the Lorb leader. His thoughts were too bent on an old saying he'd heard whispers of around Corona.

(He'd heard it that day nineteen years ago, from the King himself—when the Queen and a baby girl were finally sleeping, their breathing even, and the medic who hadn't slept in days had finally, _finally_ left to get some bedrest of his own.)

_Sometimes the universe hears your heart's desire, and gives you a second chance._

The Captain turned and looked toward the entryway of the cavern, then, not really noticing as the little Lorb hopped down and began to lead the way out. He followed, internally grateful for a reason to step outside for some fresh air.

It was... hard to breathe, under so much piled rock.

"Well, if _zhat_ is the case, good." Alfons was still talking, but his tiny voice became harder to hear as the crashing of waves and the wind in the palm fronds grew in volume all around them. "Do not fret, mustached Freinfloofer! We have heard of the wild Freinfloofer who went very ferocious. You will be safe from her here!"

He was strong. He could dig. He could— _in theory_ —contain any of the little leaf-people who might get in his way of fixing at least _one_ of his regrets.

He stepped out of the hidden cave and onto the narrow sand paths of the island, barely noticing the salty ocean air or the sun on his face. It was hard to, when his thoughts were still _there_ , staring hopelessly out a gap in the rocks at the ruins of a shadowy labyrinth as a voice echoed so spitefully in his mind.

_I—don't—take orders from you ANYMORE!_

She was so pale.


End file.
